moved for leave to introduce Bill C-227, an act to provide for the establishment of national standards for labour market training, apprenticeship and certification.

Mr. Speaker, I submit this bill in reaction to the devolution of labour market training to the provinces which has left us with an unequal and uneven regime in terms of apprenticeship and other labour market training.

As a journeyman carpenter I can say that curriculums are different in every province in the country. It does not serve industry well that persons who get their journeyman papers in Nova Scotia do not have the equal training when they move to British Columbia to get a job in that province.

Recognizing the mobility of Canada's workforce, this bill would put in place national standards for the entrance requirements to the apprenticeable trades and national standards for the curriculums in each of the trades. It would also seek to create a national advisory committee for each of the skilled trades to keep those curriculums up to date and current. This national advisory board would have labour, industry and government representation.

The bill seeks to fill a glaring void left behind by the government's hasty devolution of labour market training powers to the provinces. This would remedy some of the gap in our human resources strategy as it pertains to labour market training, other than post-secondary education.